Louisiana State Uniform Construction Code Council meeting 121217

Louisiana State Uniform Construction Code Council met Tuesday, Dec. 12, 2017, in Baton Rouge to decide whether to start using the new construction code. Gov. John Bel Edwards had suspended its implementation to counter delays in flood recovery. From left to right is Mark Joiner, executive director of the council; Bobby Joe Byrd, of Woodworth, acted as the council’s chairman for the meeting, and Bholanath V. Dhume, of New Orleans.

A new set of standards for constructing buildings were approved Tuesday after the governor withdrew his opposition, which had delayed for six months the codes going into effect.

After receiving word that Gov. John Bel Edwards would rescind his June 14 order, the Louisiana State Uniform Construction Code Council voted again to enact the new rules that regulate everything from the thickness of materials used to how the plumbing is done.

Now that the process has restarted, builders likely will have to start following the new construction codes in February.

About two weeks before the rewritten standards were to go into effect, Edwards ordered the code council on June 14 not to proceed. He feared that the new rules would delay rebuilding from the August 2016 flooding that damaged or destroyed thousands of homes and businesses. But his order also stalled construction projects around the state – about $700 million worth in New Orleans alone.

Edwards withdrew his June order Monday night and published the decision Tuesday afternoon after the code council voted again to enact the revisions.

Chairman Bobby Joe Byrd, of Woodworth, said he thought the code council already voted to install the new codes before the governor’s June postponement.

“We thought we had dotted all the I’s and crossed the T’s,” said Mark Joiner, the commission’s executive director. “But the decision is that we had to vote again.”

New Orleans building official, Zachary Smith, asked the council to unanimously approve to show a “strong reaffirmation” that the code council backed using the new code despite the governor’s order to delay.

“In the City of New Orleans, we continue to be impacted on a day to day basis,” Smith said. His office had identified up to $700 million in projects from Orleans Parish that had to be replanned.

Builders of large projects said they had designed their buildings, planned their construction schedules, and bought their supplies based on the new code being in place when ground was broken. When implementation was delayed, they had to stall construction. Redesigning to meet the existing code would have caused tens of thousands of additional dollars.

Chad Ross of the Federal Emergency Management Agency criticized the new rules saying they don’t include requirements that buildings be one foot over the base flood elevation. “Insurance rates will double” because that standard was left out, he warned.

The code committee had stripped that language out of the regulations arguing that under Louisiana’s legal system leaving in what is called freeboard would have required the entire state to adhere to the elevation standards.

Council member Bholanath V. Dhume, of New Orleans, said the state’s geography makes such a requirement expensive and unnecessary for builders in north Louisiana. Besides, local boards can – and do, Baton Rouge being one jurisdiction – make elevation part of their local code.

Ross countered that most local jurisdictions don’t approve the elevation requirement.

All 14 of the 20 members attending the code council meeting voted to replace the current rules, adopted in 2012, with the 2015 editions of the International Building Code, International Residential Code, International Plumbing Code, International Existing Building Code, International Fuel Gas Code and International Mechanical Code, and the 2014 edition of the National Electric Code.

Follow Mark Ballard on Twitter, @MarkBallardCnb.